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Unreal Tournament 2004
Unreal Tournament 2004, also known as UT2K4 and UT2004, is the sixth installment in the Unreal series and the third installment in the Unreal Tournament series. The game was developed by Epic Games and Digital Extremes, and was released on March 16, 2004 in North America. __TOC__ Synopsis Overview UT2004 is basically an extension of the work done in Unreal Tournament 2003, retaining most of the maps, characters and gametypes from that release, tweaking various issues that were brought up, and adding a considerable amount of new content: nearly 50 new maps, vehicular combat, the Assault gametype which had been excluded from UT2003, and the new gametype Onslaught. Among significant changes to gameplay mechanics and visual presentation, one of the major additions introduced by Unreal Tournament 2004 is the inclusion of vehicles and the Onslaught game type, allowing for large-scale battles. The game features all or most of the content of its predecessor, replacing it on the shop shelves. Unreal Tournament 2004 boxes sold in the United States include a $10 mail-in rebate requiring that a short form be completed and sent to the publisher along with a copy of the manual cover for Unreal Tournament 2003. Versions sold in the United Kingdom had a similar offer, but required sending in the play CD for Unreal Tournament 2003 instead. Its successor, Unreal Tournament 3, was released on November 19, 2007. Development history UT2004 was built with the Unreal Engine 2.5 and the content of its predecessor, UT2003. It addressed many of 2003's shortcomings, including almost doubling the amount of content available. Epic Games was the primary developer for the bulk of UT2004, which consisted mainly of building upon the work done for Unreal Tournament 2003. Epic collaborated with several other development studios in the creation of UT2004. Lead programmer Steve Polge described the role of each company involved: ;Epic Games : Enhancements to the Unreal Tournament 2003 game types, the new UI, Voice over IP and bot voice command support, engine enhancements and optimizations. They also made an improved single player game, and improved community and demo recording support, in addition to 31 new playable characters. A Sniper Rifle similar to the one included in the original Unreal Tournament was added. AI support was incorporated for the Onslaught mode. 31 maps were made by them: one Onslaught map, 16 new Deathmatch maps, 5 new Capture The Flag Maps, 2 new Double Domination maps and 1 new Bombing Run map were added. The Assault gametype design and implementation were also reintroduced from the original Unreal Tournament. ;Psyonix : The Onslaught gametype design and implementation, with 6 new vehicles, 4 new weapons (Grenade Launcher (UT2004), Mine Layer, Anti-Vehicular Rocket Launcher (AVRiL), and the Target Painter), and the Energy Turret. They also created seven Onslaught maps, and collaborated with Streamline Studios on the popular map ONS-Torlan. Finally, they made the new model for the Translocator. ;Digital Extremes :3 new DM maps, 6 new CTF maps, 2 new Bombing Run maps, and 3 new Double Domination maps, 2 new playable characters, the new HUD design; new weapon models for the Assault Rifle, Shock Rifle, and Link Gun. ;Streamline Studios :The single player introduction movie and ONS-Torlan in collaboration with Psyonix. Streamline later created Assault map AS-Confexia, which they released for free. Upon release, UT2004 utilized build 3186 of the Unreal Engine 2. The Editors Choice Edition utilized build 3323, and the Mega Pack utilizes build 3369, the latest patch to UT2004. Unreal Tournament 2004 was the first closed source game to support the new x86-64-bit extension, utilizing Linux, as Windows for x86-64 had not been released at the time. Several middleware engines are incorporated into UT2004, including: * Pixomatic Software Renderer * Karma Physics Engine * OpenAL Audio System * LIPsinc Facial Animation Software Demo Epic released the demo for UT2004 on February 11th, 2004, for multiple platforms, including Windows, Mac OS X, Linux on x86-32 (February 13, 2004) and Linux on x86-64 (February 15, 2004). It used build 3120 of the Unreal Engine 2 and has five maps from the game's library: AS-Convoy, BR-Colossus, CTF-BridgeOfFate, DM-Rankin and ONS-Torlan. On September 24th, 2004, Epic released an updated version of the demo, using the (at the time) latest codebase for UT2004, Version 3334. Besides the obvious inclusion of many bugfixes and adjustments from the retail version, it added some new vehicles from the Editor's Choice Edition, as well as added two more maps to play (CTF-FaceClassic and ONS-Primeval), for a grand total of Seven. Release dates * March 15, 2004 - Unreal Tournament 2004 (PC - Linux x86-32/x86-64 and Windows) - Six-CD set * March 15, 2004 - Unreal Tournament 2004 (PC - Linux x86-32/x86-64 and Windows) - Single-DVD * March 15, 2004 - Unreal Tournament 2004 (PC - Linux x86-32/x86-64 and Windows) - Limited Special Edition - 2-DVD set with Logitech Internet Chat Headset and a series of UnrealEd video tutorials developed by 3DBuzz. * March 31, 2004 - Unreal Tournament 2004 (PC - Mac OS X) - single-DVD * April 13, 2004 - Unreal Tournament 2004 (PC - Linux x86-32/x86-64 and Windows) - 2 DVD set * September 21, 2004 - Unreal Tournament 2004 Editors Choice Edition - included three new vehicles, four new Onslaught maps, six new characters, and several selected community mods. * September 23, 2004 - Editors Choice Edition material available for free download for owners of the original release of UT2004. * October 1, 2005 - Windows x86-64 downloadable patch. * December 2, 2005 - Mega Bonus Pack released online - including patch to v3369, the Editors Choice Edition material, and several new maps. * November 6, 2006 - released as a portion of the Unreal Anthology collection. * March 17, 2008 - Unreal Deal Pack. * Later 2008 - Unreal Tournament 2004 Editors Choice Edition (GOG.com). Windows XP Bonus Maps Two maps were released by Epic mappers Clawfist and Nathillien through Gamespot using an installer that limited limited itself to Windows XP. The maps were soon redistributed by others without the installer, allowing anyone to use them. The maps in this package were ONS-Aridoom and ONS-Ascendancy. Editor's Choice Edition The editor's choice edition of Unreal Tournament 2004 was a 2-DVD special edition of the game with some bonus content, including four Onslaught maps, three Onslaught vehicles, six new characters, and eleven mods. The second disc included the same video tutorials included with the special edition of the initial release. Soon after the ECE went on sale, the bonus game content - minus the tutorial videos - was made available for download by existing owners of the game. The three new vehicles can be used in stock and XP maps through the Bonus Vehicles mutator. Also included were four new maps using the vehicles. Most of the mods included in the ECE were winners or finalists in Epic's Make Something Unreal Contest. The user created mods included in this release were: Mega Pack The Mega Pack contains the ECE Bonus Pack, UT2004 patch 3369 and some Assault, Capture the Flag and Deathmatch maps. The maps are special editions of maps originally made by community mappers. The Assault maps were upgraded with intros and announcements by the original female announcer voice, as well as several fixes. Game content Gamemodes UT2004 features every gametype already present in UT2003: Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, Double Domination, Capture The Flag, Bombing Run, Invasion, Last Man Standing and Mutant, plus four new gametypes: Onslaught, Assault, Vehicle CTF and Instagib CTF. Vehicle CTF has no official maps, though fan-made maps can be dropped and the gametype will appear. ICTF was introduced later in a patch. The game features almost all of UT2003's maps and then doubles its numbers with new content. 55 new maps are added to the existing 51, with another 15 maps becoming available through free bonus packs. These bring the total number of official maps to a whopping 121. CTF and ICTF share the CTF mappool. ONS, AS, BR and DDOM have their own set of maps each. The rest of the gametypes use the Deathmatch set of maps. Characters Weapons Unreal Tournament 2004 sports an extensive array of weapons, combining updated classic weapons from Unreal Tournament, newer weapons from UT2003, and all-new weapons. Several weapons were designed specifically for use in vehicle-based gametypes, and typically appear only in those gametypes. Superweapons can be turned off as an option, and so they may or may not appear in-game depending on the server setup. Like every game in the Unreal series, the weapons are distributed in an array of 10 slots. * Doesn't use a slot: Ball Launcher * Weapon slot 0 (q): Translocator * Weapon slot 1: Shield Gun * Weapon slot 2: Assault Rifle * Weapon slot 3: Bio Rifle, Mine Layer * Weapon slot 4: Shock Rifle, Super Shock Rifle * Weapon slot 5: Link Gun * Weapon slot 6: Minigun * Weapon slot 7: Flak Cannon, Grenade Launcher * Weapon slot 8: Rocket Launcher, AVRiL * Weapon slot 9: Lightning Gun, Sniper Rifle * Weapon slot 10 (0): Redeemer, Ion Painter, Target Painter Items Vehicles One of the most prominent additions to UT2004 is vehicles. They only appear in the Onslaught, Assault and Vehicle CTF game modes. The full set consist of aircraft types and land vehicles. There are also two spacecrafts which only officially feature in a few maps, and different types of gun turrets which players can take control of. Teams The selectable characters of UT2004 are divided into seven races: the default six of 2003 (Humans, Anubans, Automatons, Juggernauts, Gen Mo'Kai, Nightmares) and the Skaarj as a seventh playable race. The playable characters are divided into 12 teams: Soundtrack Will Nevins (Sound Design Group, SDG-''), Kevin Riepl (''KR-'') and Starsky Partridge (''Level#) are credited for working on the music in Unreal Tournament 2004. Reception Unreal Tournament 2004 was greeted with positive reviews and community reaction, with critics citing unique, fast-paced, fun and challenging nature of the game as the main selling points, while fans touted the post-release support and extensive modding capabilities. The game also received awards for Multiplayer Game of the Year (IGN, Gamespy, Computer Gaming World) and Best Value for 2004 award (Computer Games Magazine). On the downside, UT2004 was not seen as a true successor to Unreal Tournament by some fans. In particular, many players disliked the floatier game mechanics and increased dodging abilities compared to UT that made it much more difficult to hit skilled opponents with non-hitscan weapons. Essential Files Here you can find a list of official and unofficial, yet essential, files for your game. Trivia * UT2003 and UT2004 share most of the same content and codebase, though UT2004 contains much more content. :* Unreal Tournament 2004 sought to remedy some of the complaints with the gameplay in Unreal Tournament 2003. One of the most influential changes to the core gameplay was change in the weaponswitch speed. This change prevented players from switching weapons quickly in order to increase their rate of fire. There was also a major change in the netcode, which better accommodates vehicle gametypes and large player counts, but "broke" compatibility with UT2003 and any mods that were designed to use UT2003 netcode. * Originally, UT2004 was supposed to be backwards compatible with UT2003: 2003 players could play on 2004 servers and vice versa. Due to the massive changes present in the 2004 engine (mainly due to the vehicles: some vehicle code was present in 2003 but was cut due to time constraints), compatibility was eventually dropped before release. * According to Ryan "Icculus" Gordon, the Unreal Tournament 2004 installer for Linux is based in the one done for Unreal Tournament 2003.Interview: Ryan C. Gordon, "Icculus" @ abclinuxu.cz * According to a PlanetUnreal article, the Necris were going to be shipped with he game. In the end, only two of them were included as part of the ECE Bonus Pack.Unreal Tournament 204 Trip Report @ planetunreal.com * UT2004 has the second highest weapon count in any Unreal game (17) only below Unreal Championship 2: The Liandri Conflict. * There's a bug where a player cannot have both a Target Painter and Ion Painter at the same time. * The box art features Skaarj bots as the highlighted character- Dominator for the standard installer pack and Mekkor for the Editor's Choice Edition or ECE bonus pack. * This game is the final PC release in the UT series, which features Unreal Engine 2. * The game was deemed one of the "1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die" (2013 edition) by Tony Mott, editor of Edge magazine, on the eponymous book."1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die" @ Wikipedia UT2004 and Windows 7 Firewall Issues You may find while trying to play UT2004 in Windows 7, that you are unable to even get to the server browser because of a message indicating that the Windows Firewall does not have an exception for the game. Even after allowing UT2004 through the firewall, the game will still not work. To fix this, you must add the following to your UT2004.ini:Thread: "Multiplayer w/o administrative rights" @ Epic Forums FireWall IgnoreSP2=1 External links and references See also *Unreal Tournament *Unreal Tournament 2003 *Unreal Tournament 3 Category:Games